Surviving Mars
We often say management is trapped in its own sealed-off bubble. Little did we know Fraser Brown had them trapped on Mars…
We often say management is trapped in its own sealed-off bubble. Little did we know Fraser Brown had them trapped on Mars.
Surviving on this inhospitable world is no mean feat, but it’s worth the effort. Humans don’t start coming to Mars until they can live there, so all the infrastructure needs to be established first. By the time the first human set foot on the planet, we had an elaborate life-support network pumping oxygen and electricity to everything from domes to drones, as well as lots of ideas about what to tackle next. The list of potential objectives is daunting, but by not forcing you to worry about the needs of the colonists first, Surviving Mars has a forgiving early game. Despite its survival bent, Surviving Mars still follows the same pattern as Haemimont’s
Tropico, turning resources into finished products and building whole industries out of them, all the while trying to keep everyone happy. It’s something familiar to hold onto when the curve balls start flying.
Mechanical helpers
Between the dust, meteors and tornados, carving out a life on Mars is a lot of work. Overcoming these disasters and watching as an army of drones fixes everything is an incredibly satisfying experience. If you’ve planned for the worst, kept your stockpiles topped up and put your drones in the right place, you’ll be treated to a mechanical ballet as diligent gatherers scoop up resources and then, in seconds, have everything under control, fixing up machines and repairing drones all over the colony.
Even once you’ve got some automation set up, however, it still feels like disaster is nipping at your heels. It’s a battle between humans and nature, and for all the fancy tech, it’s dogged perseverance that builds successful colonies.
Surviving Mars constantly drives you to expand, whether through resources running out or colonists needing more services. Unsurprisingly, expansion puts even more demands on your colony.
Since these complex colonies can grow to a gargantuan size, Surviving Mars needs a solid UI to make sense of it. Unfortunately, the one it has isn’t up to the task. There are quality-of-life features, like the ability to pin things to a taskbar for quick access, but the menus are messy and there’s a lot missing. It provides a broad overview of the colony, but there needs to be more ways to dig into the details.
The result is a lot of extra micro-management, which seems out of place in a game where you command armies of automated helpers. We actually like that even once you get a pretty advanced colony going you still need to be hands on, but there’s often just too much to juggle at once.
As fiddly and stressful as Surviving Mars can be, nothing else marries survival and city building so deftly. It’s a tricky but satisfying space disaster, but we still feel bad about any colonists who bite the red dust...